


Lost, Not Dead

by Lenny9987



Series: Unrelated Faithlets [4]
Category: Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Book 3: Voyager, Other, minor Voyager spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-02
Updated: 2016-02-02
Packaged: 2018-05-17 03:58:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5853211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lenny9987/pseuds/Lenny9987
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by a prompt from Tumblr about how Lord John might react to meeting Faith. Part of my Unrelated Faithlets AU series. Includes some small bits of dialogue from Voyager.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lost, Not Dead

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr prompt:
> 
> flightsnitch96 submitted "I was just rereading voyager and I can’t help wondering what John Grey’s reaction would have been to meeting Faith along with realising Claire is Jamie's presumably dead wife or even what John would have thought at meeting Faith for the first time."

Captain Leonard had been very strict in his orders to Lord John Grey - with this plague aboard he was not about to risk the recently appointed governor’s health by letting him roam about the ship. For the most part, Grey had complied with the Captain’s orders. Grey had no desire to share the fate of the men in the sickbay and understood the young man’s determination to succeed in the ship’s stated mission of delivering Grey safely to Jamaica. Their battlegrounds might be different, but soldiers were soldiers and even if he’d only become captain by default, Captain Leonard was still an officer with a duty to discharge. 

Even under his severely restricted circumstances, Grey had heard about the surgeons the _Porpoise_  had appropriated from a merchant ship - a mother and daughter, apparently, to their original ship’s supercargo (a position Grey only vaguely understood). More surprising than two women taking charge of the sailors’ care was the manner with which everyone spoke of the pair of them. Captain Leonard was desperate and the woman - a Mrs. Malcolm - was forceful and commanding enough to be effective and it took a little of the weight off the young captain’s shoulders, leaving him clearly grateful. The daughter - whom he believed was called Faith - had caused a bigger stir among the crew, many of whom were young and had gone some time without a young lady to distract them. Where her mother and the captain had encountered difficulties or resistance in implementing and maintaining the quarantine, Faith Malcolm proved successful. 

After a time, Grey began to go fear he would go mad if he did not escape the confines of his cabin, even for just a few minutes’ time. He waited until the sun had set and there was a reasonable chance that the captain had gone to bed before striking out for a brief stroll on the deck and some time alone with the moon and the stars.

He wasn’t familiar with _all_ of the customary noises of a ship at sea, but he was pretty sure the banging he heard wasn’t among them. He found a woman who could only be Mrs. Malcolm banging her hand against the rail in frustration.

“Stop that!” he called to her before intervening as she offered resistance. 

“Who the hell are you?” she asked, her roiled emotions still playing clearly across her face. 

“My name is Grey. I expect that you must be the famous Mrs. Malcolm, whose heroism Captain Leonard has been so strongly praising,” Grey said in a tone meant to flatter. He appeared to be unsuccessful but before he could offer his apologies, more footsteps approached.

“Mama?” a young woman’s voice could be heard searching.

“I’m over here, Faith,” Mrs. Malcolm called.

“Mama, what’re you doing out here like this? Oh,” she started as she noticed Grey. “I didn’t realize you had company.”

“Lord John Grey, Miss Malcolm,” Grey introduced himself with a slight bow. 

“Faith,” she introduced herself curtly before turning to address her mother. “Don’t worry, I’m not here to make it twenty-four,” she fore-warned. “I just noticed that you’d gone out and wanted to make sure you were all right.”

Something about the young woman struck Grey suddenly. There was something vaguely familiar about her and yet he couldn’t put his finger on it. 

“Excuse me, Miss Malcolm but... have we met before, by any chance?” he interrupted. 

She looked at him warily before shaking her head and responding with a decided, “No.” As she appraised him before resuming the conversation with her mother, something in her eyes sparked his memory. 

Jamie Fraser. He hadn’t spoken much of the wife and children he’d lost - Grey remembered how incredibly painful it had been for him. Had he even mentioned the daughter’s name?

What’s more, the longer he looked at the young woman, the more she resembled the wife he’d met only briefly on that long ago night when she’d set his broken arm. Which of course meant Mrs. Malcolm was actually Mrs. Fraser. Once more, the longer he examined her in the moonlight, the clearer her identity became. 

But Fraser had spoken of them as being... _lost_. Not dead but _lost._  There was still a chance the two women before him weren’t Fraser’s wife and child - were truly Mrs. Malcolm and... James Alexander _Malcolm_  Mackenzie Fraser. It must be them somehow back from the dead - now that was a tale Grey was desperate to hear. Grey couldn’t imagine what state Fraser would have been in if the two women before him had actually been dead, given the depths of mourning he was in when they were simply _lost_. 

“Are you all right?” Mrs. Fraser asked, setting her frustration aside to return to her role as stern physician. “You haven’t been about the ship at night before have you? Not in the last few days?”

“No, madame,” he asserted. “Tonight was the first night I dared venture out since Captain Leonard made his request - the confines of my cabin simply became too much and I fancied stretching my legs on the deck.”

“He’s not been out long enough to be exposed then, Mama,” Faith chimed in. “But you should probably go back inside. If the captain finds you out he’ll pitch a fit.”

“We’ve had fewer cases breaking out,” Mrs. Fraser informed him, “even if those already ill are dying. But it just goes to show that the methods in place to prevent it spreading are working - one of those methods keeping you safe is your avoiding contact with those who are infected and those who have been exposed to those infected.”

“Such as yourselves?” Grey clarified.

“I’m afraid so,” Mrs. Fraser confirmed.

“Yet you show no concern for your own welfare,” Grey pointed out.

“We didn’t exactly have much choice,” Faith muttered.

“Ah, yes. Captain Leonard was reluctant to go into detail about the manner in which he enlisted your services.”

Mrs. Fraser and her daughter scoffed in perfect synchronization. 

“Your desperate captain essentially kidnapped us,” Faith admitted, disregarding her mother’s warning glare. 

“And you were traveling with a family party at the time?” Grey pressed gently. “Your husband, madame? Your son, perhaps?”

“Yes, we were traveling with my husband,” Mrs. Fraser answered carefully. Faith had quickly grown quiet, pressing her lips together and shooting several significant looks to her mother. “He is the supercargo aboard a merchant ship headed to the Indies - to Jamaica, in fact.”

“He must have been loathe to part from you. Well, we must ensure that you ladies make it into port safe and sound for his sake,” Grey said with a gracious smile, his agitation rising the longer the encounter continued. “Now if you ladies will excuse me, as you’ve already mentioned, the captain might be about and I am not supposed to be out of my cabin. I wish you both goodnight and assure you I will be praying for the souls of those lost and for the two of you to have your burdens relieved quickly by the hasty recovery of those remaining.”

“Goodnight, sir,” Mrs. Fraser and then her daughter bid him with nods. 

Grey took a roundabout route back to his cabin, desperate for the clear night air that was helping him to maintain control of his breathing. Jamie Fraser was aboard the ship the two of them had been taken from and the captain had already reassured Grey that he would reunite Mrs. Malcolm and her daughter with the crew of their original ship. 

Grey couldn’t help smiling as he returned to his cabin. He had something to think about that would help fill the remaining days at sea - one, he must find a way of learning whether anyone aboard had seen and recognized Jamie during whatever exchange had occurred to bring Mrs. Fraser and her daughter aboard and two, if Captain Leonard _did_  know about Jamie (and the reward for his capture), Grey must find a way to prevent Jamie’s arrest once he set foot on Jamaican soil. And then there was the familiar relief at the prospect that he might have an opportunity to see and speak with Jamie again himself during the coming weeks. 


End file.
